Folliculitis--warning: sort of graphic pics

[hazelrunpack]

Sunday morning, Ridge began to show some swelling and lumpiness on her muzzle--mostly along the bridge right behind the nose. I called the vet, who thought it was folliculitis and had us start her on some amoxicillin (we have a rather extensive collection of antibiotics on hand because we live so far from the vet and have so many dogs ), then we took her in yesterday morning. By the time we took her in, her follicles had begun weeping blood, and by the time she came home she looked even worse.

I took this pics after a warm compress this morning had removed much of the bright-red blood that weeps from the sores:





You can't see it, but there's an open bloody patch about the size of a 50-cent piece down the right side of her muzzle across the whiskers, as well, and some non-bloody lumps along her lips and on her chin. We're hoping that the antibiotic will clear those up without them breaking open.

She's been switched to clavamox with compresses a few times a day to help draw the infection and we're hoping that she'll be better in a few days.

Meanwhile, though, does anyone have any suggestions on

• How to make her more comfortable?
• How to keep the other dogs from wanting to clean up her face

Poor baby. Believe it or not, though, she does look better than yesterday--her eyes are brighter, so we're hoping that means she's feeling better.

But no kissies on the muzzle for poor Ridge for a while... :sad: